Bringing Life Back to The Reef

As a responsible corporate citizen and operator, Mubadala Petroleum is committed to building partnerships with the local communities in the vicinity of their operations. As a Mubadala company, they are inspired to create a positive impact on both the environment and people across Southeast Asia.

Over the years, Mubadala Petroleum has invested in community projects and initiatives that contribute to long-term, sustainable improvements by developing partnerships and programs with local authorities, organizations, groups and NGOs to understand and address community needs.

The company’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programs and projects focus on a broad set of initiatives, including environmental improvements, education and training, and economic diversification through capability building and skills enhancement.

In Thailand, Mubadala Petroleum has supported and actively participated in a variety of environmental programs ranging from coastal mangrove reforestation to artificial reefs, juvenile turtle and sea crab bank programs, to educating communities and Mubadala Petroleum staff on environmental issues for several years.

Since 2011, Mubadala Petroleum has collaborated with the Plant Genetic Conservation Project under the Royal Initiative of Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, the Naval Special Warfare Command and Chulalongkorn University on a multi-year sustainable environment program.

The partnership has helped restore coral reefs using a technique that involves culturing coral via sexual reproduction in a laboratory and subsequently transplanting juvenile coral onto degraded reefs. To date, over 2,000 healthy young coral have been harvested and transplanted into new reefs in the Gulf of Thailand.

In addition to the funding coral research, the team has also installed solar cells at the coral hatchery to provide a more environmentally friendly, long-term and cost-efficient solution to the oil-based electricity generation and support coral reef education camps for children. The project also has a “coral garden” where scientists conduct research and observation on coral rehabilitation, coral growth, coral survival as well as fish and invertebrates that use coral gardens as their homes.

The coral grew better and had a higher survival rate because of the water system… It’s never too late to save nature," says Dr. Suchana Apple Chavanich, Assistant professor, Department of Marine Science, Chulalongkorn University.